1. Field
The present invention relates to an apparatus for an assembly process, and more particularly, to an apparatus for an assembly process for gripping a flexible object such as a connector cable to automatically engage the connector cable with a connector.
2. Description of the Related Art
Generally, end-effectors, which are mounted at an end of a manipulator included in a robot's arm and perform a specific operation by contacting an object, have been widely used in the field for service robots as well as the field for industrial robots.
In the field of such end-effectors, precise and skillful operations such as those done by a human's hand account for a greater part of operations at assembly of a TV Back panel, such as gripping a connector cable and engaging the connector cable with a connector. Thus, researches on a multi-degree-of-freedom (MDOF) robot arm simulating the human's hand are being carried out. However, application of an expensive robot arm to a simple and repetitive task is economically undesirable, and control of the MDOF robot arm is very complicated, there by making the application of the robot arm to industry fields difficult.
For this reason, an operation of gripping a connector cable and engaging the connector cable with a connector is generally performed by using simple industrial grippers in the industry fields. Since the currently used industrial grippers are mostly used to horizontally grip an object with a pincer-like shape, it is difficult for the grippers to grip a thin flexible object, and a space for placement of a workbench is very limited. In addition, since the gripper has a rigid body, it may be difficult to precisely control the position of the gripper and to control a gripping force thereof.
On the other hand, since the connector's position is different according to the assembly, the gripper cannot be combined with the connector if the connector is positioned inward from an edge of a board.
Background technology of the present invention is disclosed in Korean Patent Laid-Open Publication No. 10-2014-0055277 (laid-open on May 9, 2014).